海角大神

After reportedly discovering a cache of explosives in the聽San Francisco apartment of Ryan Kelly Chamberlain, the FBI asked the public for its help in tracking聽him down, initiating a nationwide manhunt.聽The 42-year-old political and media consultant dropped out of sight over the weekend. Law enforcement warned he should be considered armed and dangerous.

The public responded, posting and Tweeting.

Then on Monday, an open letter from Mr. Chamberlain, written in advance but set up for automated release, was posted, detailing his lifelong struggle with depression, love, and work and suggesting that he was at the end of the line. A subsequent letter, reacting to the FBI鈥檚 weekend warnings but also posted Monday, disputed the notion that he was a threat.

Monday鈥檚 postings have prompted even more聽online dialogue from those who knew him as well as interested strangers, providing an avalanche of opinions, ideas, and information about his activities and personal taste.

Some of this may eventually prove useful to law enforcement, say experts. But this barrage of social media in the midst of an active manhunt points out the聽growing positive as well as negative impact of participatory real-time, citizen聽sleuthing.

鈥淲e all love good stories, and a real-time聽criminal investigation in which we can take part is as good as it gets,鈥� says Janet聽Johnson, assistant professor of social media communication at the University of Texas at Dallas.

However, Professor Johnson notes that the聽history of mass media is rich with the tragic and near-tragic consequences of mixing media and police work. Take the 1972聽Munich Olympics at which Palestinian terrorists took Israeli athletes聽hostage. The gunmen were able to outmaneuver the police as they watched their stakeout聽covered on local television. All the hostages were eventually killed.

Fast forward to the modern era with citizen social media thrown into the mix. Law enforcement鈥檚 pursuit of the Boston Marathon bombers in April 2013 showed聽the power of social media to provide new clues 鈥� police retrieved聽roughly a million videos and photos that helped track the suspects down.

But, the headlong determination of the public to help out also led to postings on Reddit聽fingering the wrong man.

Johnson notes that the social media outlet learned its lesson 鈥� after the subsequent Washington Navy Yard shooting that September, Reddit immediately shut down its聽sub-community 鈥淔indNavyYardShooters,鈥� to avoid repeating the earlier embarrassment.

Chamberlain, a professional social media contractor, has helped feed聽the public鈥檚 social media response with his carefully timed postings, points out Charles Palmer, executive director of the Center for Advanced Entertainment and Learning Technologies at Harrisburg University of Science and Technology in Pennsylvania.

Chamberlain聽may have been聽nominally posting to his own聽circle of social media friends, apologizing and explaining himself, but the messages were crafted after the FBI searched his home. As a pro, he would know the potential reach of any online posting, and of course, says Professor Palmer, this is intentional. 鈥淗e is looking for sympathy and understanding, for his experience,鈥� he adds.

Social media is permanently in the mix of any investigation from now on, says Fordham University media聽professor Paul Levinson, author of 鈥淣ew New Media.鈥澛燭he new technologies enable participation in a way that is almost unimaginable even a generation ago, he says, 鈥渨hich is a double-edged sword.鈥�

On the one hand, he points out, such public participation聽provides incredible reach. But, the pitfalls are only聽just now emerging. Police were having a hard time doing their job during the Boston bombing investigation, he says, because people were hanging out on street corners trying to photograph their work as they did it.

But, he adds, it is not going away. 鈥淲e are going to have to learn to聽live with it,鈥� he says.